The Olympic Tape Delay Is RUINING The Phelps Story
I am spending more time watching the Olympics this year than I have in many years. I love the multiple channels and HD of it all.
But with the central story for America this year happening in prime time on the East Coast, the West Coast/Mountain Time Zone are getting SCREWED!
There is not a single general news outlet on the web that is not leading with each race each day. If you open a new alert from the NYT or WSJ or others without thinking… you know what is going to happen in 3 hours.
It is truly horrible. And given the weight of the story, it is time for NBC to get its head out of its ass and to do something about it. Yeah… if you want to be a turtle all afternoon and then watch in Prime Time only, you still can. Great. But if there is a 10p swim, as there was tonight, either put it on one of the 7 other channels running and then, hey, don’t put it all over the place. But we on the West Coast deserve to see this live.
This is the Oscars… everything else, including the basketball hype show, is The Golden Globes. Of course, NBC is idiotic about that too… they should be live in Los Angeles, then repeated… and they can be tape delayed everywhere else. But a company town will watch the damned show early and many will watch again to see the highlights of the first live show.
But I digress…
Please… please… please… stop doing this. I know it’s only a medal and a sporting event, etc. And it’s not unpleasant to see it, even knowing the outcome. But it’s not the same. And it is unneccessary. And stupid. And if I had a Neilsen box or a diary, I’d be watching some other TV to avoid giving credit to NBC for hold out on half the country in a way that goes 100% against their entire effort to expand and open up the games this year.
Simple answer: MOVE!
Long answer: Now you know how it feels when you review a movie in SEPTEMBER that I will not see until JANURARY. Do you like that feeling? You like that LIMITED RELEASING? DO YA?
Silliness aside; this is the reason why the Today show never airs live here in the Central Time Zone and why the Macy’s Thanksgivings day parade airs an hour behind on tape delay. NBC simply are stuck in an old paradigm.
If more people complain. They might change it, but I doubt it. This is simply the world we live in. The West Coast in 3 hours behind, and you have to deal with it. It’s ridiculous, but you have great weather. So it’s a trade off.
Yeah, I am coming off rather snarky, but this is NBC. You know; the network that tried pay per view in 92, screwed up Australia with tape delay, and tried their damnest not to make Greece work four years ago. They simply have no idea how to make LIVE COVERAGE ACROSS THIS COUNTRY WORK.
I would simply be happy if the screen didn’t say “LIVE” when we all know it isn’t here in the Pacific zone.
Oh, and isn’t a lot of this stuff supposedly streaming, and “LIVE” for reals, online?
Sounds like we’ve got much better coverage in Spain than you guys… Three channels showing it live, and then repeats at more reasonable hours (like the swimming gold medal races, which are all too damn early for us -4am- so they’ll be primetime E.T. per NBC’s request). I actually managed to see Phelps latest two medals live this morning due to a bout of insomnia (bloody heat wave!) and was wowed!!! But even knowing the results and watching the repeats gives me a thrill to be witnessing such Olympic greatness! I mean, hell! the 4×100 relay… I knew the US had won, but watching the race I actually thought I must have read the wrong results on the internet ’cause I couldn’t see how Litzak (right name?) coul possibly overtake the French… and then holy shit!!!
My only problem with these Olympics is that it’s not clear at what times the different events will be on. The Beijing page is something of a mess with schedules (particularly for tennis) and the Spanish channels aren’t very accurate when they tell you what will be showing when…
The other frustrating thing is living in a country where there aren’t athletes (with medal chances) in all sports… I keep missing out on the gymnastics and diving ’cause since we don’t have any decent contenders they don’t bother replaying them during the day… :s I did see the women this morning (after the swimming), sorry for the silver over there, but those Chinese girls were amazing!!!
Jeff: they are mostly streaming events that they are not showing on any of the UNIVERSAL FAMILY of STATIONS. The fact that they keep the “LIVE” banner up on a tape delay, is pretty freakin lame.
Cris: We have 3600 hours of coverage, but the WEST coast is being tape-delayed for some reason. A reason that makes absolute no freakin sense.
Oh boo hoo. Really. Have a bloody cry why don’t ya. You want to complain? Well, because China felt the need to make their swimming events live for American prime time it means Australia (ya know, a country around the same time zone as China and a country that is doing pretty good in the events) gets all the swimming finals between 1pm and 3pm when most people are at work.
The Olympics aren’t in America, nor are they in any time zone that correlates to America and considering Beijing is 12hrs in front of you guys, you should be lucky you get them in the evening at all. But no. And as Jeff said it is live online. Right?
ugh.
Sorry, but it pisses me off to hear people complain about things like this. Like “oh, I can’t believe I have to wait a whole week for a movie that opened in Britain already! NOT FAIR!” etc.
Also, I’m extra grouchy because I’m bedridden and there’s only so much discussion about the differences between canoeing and kayaking I can watch without going a bit batty.
Try CBC?
I have found it strange that I haven’t seen a single moment of footage this year. Not the opening ceremony, nothing. Mostly it’s because I’m not interested, it’s just not of interest to me, but normally I can’t avoid seeing something. I turn on the TV and end up watching a race or something before a show I want to watch comes on. This year it has been much easier to avoid. I had put it down to the time difference, but I’m willing to allow that NBC’s incompetence is playing a role as well.
Thing is, Kami, different release dates in different countries has had a purpose over the years. Maybe it’s not neccessary, but studios don’t do it because they are delaying gratification. The clearly think that there is more money for Dark Knight, for instance, in Japan on a different date than the US opening.
On the other hand, this Olympics thing is really close to being what it should be, making it so much more frustrating.
It might be controversial, but if NBC said they were charging $50, say, for 3 always live channels – which would be dead for at least half the day, I think – for the week, I would prefer it. At least it would be less manipulative, confusing, and frustrating.
It’s probably also time for DirecTV to offer network feeds from the other coast (depending on which side of the country you are on) as a $5 a month add-on… which ironically harkens back to the birth of cable and TBS becoming a “superstation” out of Atlanta, serving the entire nation. The networks would have a hard time doing it in any markets not owned & operated – getting NBC owned WNBC in the Vegas market would not be happy for the local NBC affiliate, for instance, seen as a grab and not a convenience – but in a time shifting culture, the opportunity to create more options, not less, makes sense… until we finally get to a east/west network feed that eliminates affiliates completely.
Speaking of Olympics, can’t you guys (in the US) get the live transmissions on the web? We can, all three spanish channels that are showing it, and Spain’s not as advanced as the States is the online content area…
I can get why distributors would consider it profitable to delay some movies… but only if they’re going for that big opening weekend. This week in Spain (between last Friday and today) we’ve finally gotten Wall*E, The Dark Night and Mamma Mia! It’s been hell to have to wait a month, but they’ll be sure to take advantage of the major 3-day weekend that starts this Friday… on the other hand it’s cheating them out of a month of summer movie-goers! The holidays end in 2 weeks… kids go back to school… oh well. No one goes much to the movies here in the summer anyway. At least not in my city. We’d rather spend the time at the beach! ;o)
By the way… Mamma Mia! was a blast! ;o) It won’t win any awards, but I can’t remember when was the last time I had so much pure and simple fun in the movies! Wall*E this weekend in a summer open air theatre (with our own sandwiches drinks etc, a Spanish summer tradition), and the Dark Night next week. I’ve been weeks dying for a decent film to watch and now boom! A new burst of releases. Frustrating…
Speaking of which, another new release here: Vengeance, with Liam Neeson. Anyone seen it? My dad’s been harping on me t go with him… I postponed it yesterday in favour of MM! I haven’t heard any mention of it around here…
I just caught a mini-package on SportsCenter interviewing Lebron and Dwayne Wade about Phelps. Good stuff.
My cable provider caries WDIV and other eastern stations for the other networks. I guess your cable provider is too “comcastic”.
This is the network that has completely yanked it’s top scripted show (Heroes) and struggling returning one (Life) off the air instead of running repeats to bring in more viewers and keep the die-hards happy.
Meanwhile, Fox shows it DOES deserve it’s first place position because not only have they been rerunning the entire season of House to build for the return in September they also have been doing the same with the barely renewed Sarah Conner.
NBC just doesn’t have a clue. They think that Hula removed any need for repeats.
FOX deserves it’s first place position?! I’ll wait and see how much support they give Dollhouse and Sarah Connor next year…
Dave you completely missed my point.
Yes, it’s silly that it’s not airing LIVE on the west coast, but it’s also silly that a country of one billion people changed Olympic tradition for fuckin’ NBC. Stop whingeing and get an online stream already.
TV money drives all major sporting events, Kami. sad, but true.
Want to know what time your favorite college team is playing on November? BZZT!!! Wait until the TV folks decide in October.
…which is why it makes perfect sense for NBC to leave their west coast coverage as it is. Most people aren’t online every hour, all day, don’t know who already won the events, and are perfectly satisfied to have the prime time tape delay if that means they get to see gymnastics rather than sculling.
I don’t like the tape delay either, but you said it yourself: It’s about the money.
Are there any hot female athletes I should be making lecherous comments about yet?
I’m not following these Olympics very closely.
Any new chicks who’ll turn up in Maxim soon?
I don’t know what you’re talking about with college football, but all I‘m saying is that you should be thankful that the swimming finals are being shown in American prime time at all.
I’m watching Phelps in something right now and it’s 1.10pm. If I was at work like I’m supposed to be (i can’t walk so I’m off sick) I would miss it and all I’d get was a segment about it on the news when I get home at night.
KC: NBC are not only one of the biggest networks on this planet. They are also own by a conglomerate, and paid the most for Olympic coverage. Basically; all the coverage you see is paid for by NBC in some way. So really the IOC will move things around for us because NBC SUPPORTS THEM WITH BILLIONS!
Which makes it all the more daft and frustrating to hear people complaining that they’re getting their telecast a few hours later than they would lake considering a lot of other places around the world are getting the telecast at far less desirable times (Cris, myself, etc).
the IOC are the biggest bunch of corrupt bastards the sporting world has ever seen. (that might end my olympic gold medal dream for ‘most hours without sleeping’, but so be it. i can’t seem to work, either)
When Michael Phelps was going for his record 10th gold medal, NBC did not show the race live in the States. It took the Aussies to bring that unpleasant fact up.
F/X-driven opening ceremony + lip-synched music + tape-delay telecasts = FAIL.
Chuck, the tape-delay telecast isn’t the Olympic organisers’ fault, it’s NBC’s!!! place the blame correctly! at least you didn’t have to get up at 4am to watch Phelps win his record-breaking 10th medal!!! I did! but then I did get to see it live so… :p
A serious black point against them in my opinion is their rush to finish the tennis tournament on schedule (by sunday)… when nothing else will be occupying that arena afterwards! In order to do so they had matches starting at midnight tonight (on the 14th)!!! It’s utterly ridiculous! At least Nadal managed to wrap up his match in just over an hour (with the Spanish basketball team among the few people in the public cheering him on), and he won’t be at a disadvantage when facing his opponent in tomorrow’s semifinals ’cause Djokovic just barely managed to pull off a 3-set victory minutes before Nadal finished his… But poor Federer and the Williams sisters, after fighting and losing their singles matches, had to wait around to start their doubles matches that didn’t start till half past midnight! Thank heavens more rain (which is what delayed today’s program) forced them to stop those matches and reschedule for tomorrow. But whoever wins those matches and the last women’s 1/4f that had also started (at 1am!!!) will have to finish their matches tomorrow and then a couple of hours later play the next round against a much fresher opponent! Let’s just say the Bryan brothers will have a much easier semifinal than originally planned…
I mean, if rain was possibly going to be a factor (and it always is unless you’re on the Mediterranean in summer), why the hell didn’t they build a (retractable or not) roof on the main tennis court? That could have reduced the effects of some of these delays!!!
Ok, done ranting. I’m just pissed I won’t get to see Federer and Nadal in a historic 5 set match for the gold! ;o) Blake must be in high heaven tonight…
Phelps is going for gold number 6 tomorrow? I guess I’d better set my alarm clock for 4am again! ;o)
I only saw a snippet of it myself, but everybody I know who saw the allegedly ‘FAIL’ing opening ceremonies said they were spectacular and amazing. But of course, they were made with the participation of noted Oscar Whore ™ Zhang Yimou.
Ok, so I’m 2 days late and a few bucks short, but here’s my two cents worth…
I don’t even have to read David’s posting or the other comments to have a strong opinion here. Considering the huge time difference between China and the U.S. (and yes David, us here on the West Coast in particular), I was thinking during the opening ceremonies how can NBC be so far behind when the games themselves were probably under way while we’re watching the opening cermonies! DUH!
It’s 2008, not 1978…
We presume jeffmcm is on the West Coast so naturally he will be thrilled with tape delay the rest of the way.
But wait … there’s more! The opening ceremonies with the Blue Screen of Death are the appetizer. Peking’s version of Whitney Houston is the appetizer.
We presume jeffmcm is on the West Coast so naturally he will be thrilled with tape delay the rest of the way.
But wait … there’s more! The opening ceremonies with the Blue Screen of Death are the appetizer. Peking’s version of Whitney Houston is the entree.
Chucky, do you read anything on this blog beyond the headline of each thread?
And did you just use the royal ‘we’?
Whoa, whoa, whoa! Someone used a person for appearances and used a different voice for the audio?! It’s the biggest scam ever perpetrated by man! Tear it down! Bring in the car, bring in the CAR!!
Update: The talking alien at the ’84 closing ceremonies was neither an alien or the one speaking.
“It’s probably also time for DirecTV to offer network feeds from the other coast (depending on which side of the country you are on) as a $5 a month add-on…”
David, I don’t live in LA, but this link might help you out.
http://www.laist.com/2007/06/14/la_directv_cust.php